New Delhi: Compound archery coach Lenin Cherukuri died in a road accident at Jupdi village, near Vijayawada, in the wee hours on Sunday. He is survived by his wife.

Considered one of the few top class compound archery coaches in India, Lenin (27) died while returning to his hometown, Vijayawada, after attending a function organised by the Andhra Pradesh governor ESL Narasimhan and chief minister K. Rosaiah in Hyderabad to felicitate the Commonwealth Games (CWG) medal winners from the state.

Lenin and two of his CWG silver medal winning wards — Ritul Chatterjee and Jignas Chittibomma — were felicitated in the function. Ritul, Jignas and Chinna Raju Srither had won silver in the men’s compound category event, at CWG.

Ritul, who was with Lenin in the car at the time of accident, escaped with minor injuries.

Lenin’s father Satyanarayana, his cousin and friend, who were in the vehicle, escaped unhurt.

Vijayawada commissioner of police P Sitaraman Janeyulu said that Lenin had been driving the car when it lost balance and hit a road divider. The coach died almost instantly.

“It is a big blow for archery in India,” said Pareshnath Mukherjee, the secretary general of the Archery Association of India (AAI). “I still cannot accept the fact that Lenin would die at such a young age. Rarely in my career as a sports administrator have I seen a more dedicated person than Lenin.”

So dedicated was Lenin that he remained attached with the archery squad as a volunteer during the Commonwealth Games despite not being officially designated as the coach.

“He did his job well as we can see it from the results,” said Mukherjee.

Lenin had been a leading archer and had even won a silver in the team event in the Asian Grand Prix meet in 2005.

His death came as a jolt to the compound archery fraternity in the country. While recurve archery is firmly established in India, the compound event was introduced less than a decade ago and there’s still a paucity of good coaches.

Lenin came from a family that was dedicated to archery. After quitting as a player a few years back, he had been running the Cherukuri Volga Archery Academy in Vijayawada in memory of his sister.

His sister Volga was also an archer and had died in a road accident six years ago.

Lenin’s father, who is the president of the Krishna District Archery Association, had established the archery academy, after selling his ancestral land.